


Blame is Just a (Lazy Person’s) Way of Making Sense out of Chaos

by rosewiththorns



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Chaos, Cuddling, Detroit Red Wings, Discipline, Forgiveness, Friendship, Gen, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, Kneeling, M/M, Mistakes, Non-Sexual Submission, Playoffs, Powerlessness, Spanking, Tampa Bay Lightning, blame, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-15
Updated: 2016-04-15
Packaged: 2018-06-02 11:54:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6565099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewiththorns/pseuds/rosewiththorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darren cost the team, and he wants Hank to make him pay. Set after game one of the Detroit-Tampa series. Written with a sight modification from a reader request.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blame is Just a (Lazy Person’s) Way of Making Sense out of Chaos

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> RedWingedCrow suggested a story like this except I took the liberty of turning a penalty into blown coverage just to make the plot fit with a more recent game, but the general concept remains essentially unaltered.

“Blame is just a lazy person’s way of making sense of chaos.”—Douglas Coupland

Blame is Just a (Lazy Person’s) Way of Making Sense out of Chaos

Before the goal where Darren had blown his coverage on just the type of shifty Russian forward a hockey player would be most likely to be humiliated by on highlight reels, time had ticked too fast—at double the rate of his heart pounding in his chest—and made it impossible for him to remember where he was supposed to be, nonetheless get there before the puck slid into the net. After the goal, time had slowed to a crawl, where every second seemed to last an eternity, so that he could torture himself with endless replays of his botched coverage and feel the stares, sharp as honed skate blades, of the teammates that could bring themselves to look at him, and the burning of the averted gazes of those who couldn’t bear to see him. 

He couldn’t blame them for looking away or for trying to incinerate him with their eyeballs, because he would probably have punched any mirror that reflected his face back at him in his current state. Hating himself and knowing that he needed to be punished, he had collapsed, falling on his knees like a penitent seeking absolution from a priest, before Hank’s stall in the locker room after the rest of the team had trickled out in twos and threes, some with murmuring half-hearted consolations to one another, and others promising a victory in the second game, but none looking as alone as he felt. 

As the locker room emptied, Hank rested a palm over Darren’s damp hair, and it would have felt like a benediction, if Darren’s guilt didn’t imagine it to be as heavy as a brick. 

“I’m sorry,” Darren choked, unable to articulate anything more around the mountain that had risen in his throat. 

“For what, kid?” Hank’s hand slid down to grasp Darren’s shaking shoulder. 

“Blowing my coverage.” Darren bit his lip so hard that he tasted the iron in his blood. “I’m the reason we lost.” 

“Everyone blows their coverage sometimes, whether they end up on a highlight reel or not.” Hank’s fingers squeezed Darren’s shoulder. “You aren’t the reason we lost, either, so stop telling yourself that. We’re a team, Darren. Do you know what that means?” 

“In general, yeah.” Darren’s brain, exhausted as his body, was too weary for mental gymnastics. “What that’s supposed to mean here, I have no clue.” 

“Well, we won’t be changing your nickname to Sherlock any time soon.” Hank tapped Darren’s nose. “It means that we win or lose as a team, not as individuals. Everybody and nobody is to blame for a loss. A loss isn’t the fault of one person, because anyone else on the team could have done enough to overcome it.” 

“I still put the team in a position where they had to overcome my mistake in the playoffs.” Darren shook his head. “That makes me a Grade A fuck-up.” 

“The only thing that makes you a fuck-up is thinking you’re a fuck-up.” Hank shook Darren’s shoulders. “Listen to me. We all made mistakes tonight, and we all need to be better, and help one another out more, but that mean we’re all fuck-ups.” 

“I was the worst.” Darren blinked back tears. “I deserve to be punished.” 

“What would you like me to do?” Hank’s question was a long sigh. “Take you over my knee?” 

Darren’s stomach knotted and his tongue, determined to match it loop for loop, tied as well, because he had never asked for a spanking, but realizing that he deserved one, nodded, eyes fixed on the floor that he couldn’t see through the tears misting his eyes no matter how fiercely he tried to blink them away. 

“Up here then.” Hank patted his lap, and, cheeks flaming, Darren threw himself over Hank’s knee before he could make the mistake of hesitating or resisting. 

Hank delivered a swift swat to Darren’s upraised rump, and Darren, somehow stupidly not expecting the assault on his upturned flank to begin at once, gasped, as Hank commanded crisply, “Other way, kid.” 

“You’re going to spank my front?” yelped Darren, hand slipping under his waist to cup a very tender and private region he didn’t even want to imagine being disciplined by Hank’s firm palm. 

Hank emitted a hearty guffaw that Darren felt was extremely inappropriate under the not remotely amusing circumstances before patting Darren almost soothingly on the buttocks. “No, I’m not going to spank you at all.” 

“But you just did,” sputtered Darren. 

“What else was I supposed to do when you presented such a tempting target?” Hank answered Darren’s protest with another chuckle and teasing tap on the bottom. 

Taking the hint, Darren rolled over and sat up, leaning against Hank’s chest and letting his head rest snugly under Hank’s ample beard. 

“Do you know why I’m not going to spank you?” Hank’s beard tickled Darren’s cheek as he whispered this question into Darren’s ear. 

“I’m finally too old for that childish punishment,” suggested Darren, hoping this was true and knowing it was false. 

“Wrong as usual.” Hank softened the impact of his words by brushing the hair away from Darren’s forehead and brushing his lips across the exposed flesh. “Because you didn’t blow your coverage on purpose, you know that, I know that, and this whole damn team knows it unless they’ve got their heads up their asses. It was a mistake, and you shouldn’t be spanked—or punished in any other way—for that. Spankings are only for when you do something wrong deliberately. Understand?” 

“Yep.” Darren nodded after taking a moment to process this, and then pressed, eager as a daffodil blooming in spring, “So, I’m forgiven then?” 

“No.” Hank rumpled Darren’s hair. “But only because there is nothing to forgive you for. Now stop blaming yourself because nobody else thinks you cost us the game.” 

“Are you sure about that?” Darren shot Hank a sidelong glance, thinking of the Magic Man, who might be tempted to stay if the Red Wings could pull together a real run at the Cup and who probably thought that Darren was a bumbling idiot holding Detroit back from that sort of success. “Do you think Pav won’t want to stick around next year because of me?” 

“Pav doesn’t want to leave because of you.” Hank massaged the nape of Darren’s taut neck. “Him leaving is about him, not you. He wants to be close to Liza, the way I want to be close to Love, and you want to be close to Reece, and, more than that, he’s afraid that the ankle surgery stole so much of what made him a special player, and that, no matter how hard he works, he’ll never be able to play the way he did before that operation. He wants to retire from the NHL still thought of as the Magic Man, not as a broken old man and shadow of his star self. If there’s any evaluation going on in his head, it’s of himself, not us. Okay?” 

“Okay.” Darren sank deeper into Hank’s chest and beard. “That’s doesn’t make me feel any better, though, because instead of thinking that I have some control over him staying or going, I know I have none. It makes me feel powerless and like everything is chaos.” 

“Identify what you can control and then control it.” Hank’s hand drifted down to rub calming circles between his shoulder blades. “That’s how you fight the chaos and feel powerful.” 

“I guess what I can control starts with my defensive coverage.” Darren’s mouth quirked into a wry grin. “I’ll focus on that for next game. Promise.”


End file.
